Chapter Text
Techno had been right in some way shape or form during the final battle for L’manburg, but one thing he was wrong about was that Tommy didn’t want to die a hero, all he ever wanted was his home back. That was all he wanted the place he and Wilbur raised from the ground up he wanted it back and he wanted everything to go back before all the war all the fighting were they could all live in blissful peace for a little while longer. Tommy didn’t know how to feel after the death of the withers and after everything happened, after Techno fled, Phil showed up and injured Wilbur but luckily enough did not kill him.
Although he thought there could have been a better outcome he thought this one was for the best, faking his death during the battle of the withers by using an invisibility potion. The amount of blood he had left behind was rather large, there were practical puddles but he could treat his injuries with healing potions. He watched from afar as everyone realized he was nowhere to be seen, he watched as they frantically searched for him calling out his name.
He was a little even heart broken when Dream, Sapnap, Karl and those who were originally against them started to help. Phil showed up with Wilbur shortly after and quickly set Wilbur down somewhere safe and began helping. He stayed until sunrise and then quickly left trying his best not to leave a blood trail. Once he was sure he was far enough from L’manburg he blocked himself into a cave and blocked it off on the inside and sat down his back against the wall and breathed heavily as he held his broken arm.
Tommy wasn’t an idiot like most assumed when it came to injuries. He knew how to treat them but he always said he didn’t so he didn’t have to help out, he never liked the look of blood on his friends and always tried to avoid treating their injuries. He pulled out one of the man healing potions he had in his inventory and downed it before ripping off his armor and then pulling off his short sleeved shirt and the long sleeved shirt he wore under it.
He winced seeing the cut on his side he had gotten when he was fighting back against Dream at some point during the battle. He breathed heavily watching the wound slowly stitch itself together from the healing potion, the sight quite gruesome. He looked into his inventory and pulled out an ender chest setting it down beside himself and pulling out some bandages that he always kept inside, he wrapped them around his left arm which was broken and then picked up his long sleeved shirt, using it to make a makeshift sling and tying the ends of the sleeves at the back of his neck.
He sighed leaning his head back against the wall, he had a lot of food in his inventory along with more potions, his weapons and some golden apples. Working with one arm wouldn’t be a problem since he’s had both broken legs and arms a lot during the past few wars that have happened on the server and they’ve had a lot of wars. Tommy sometimes wished he’d stayed neutral during everything and all of this instead of getting overly involved in all of this mess, he wished instead of following Wilbur after his exile he should have just wandered and created himself a small cottage a distance away from everything but he didn’t. The thought had crossed his mind after his exile and he had been very tempted to go through with it, to walk away and have his own lands but Wilbur had needed him more than ever.
And look where it got him, making a last minute choice to fake his death after the battle with the withers. The fact that withers make things decay will help in them thinking he’s dead so he can have some form of peace for a while, he wished Phil had shown up sooner rather than later to stop Wilbur and maybe things wouldn’t have turned out this way but he wasn’t going to blame this on Phil. He had wanted so badly to stay and run to Phil, to have his father hug and hold him and tell him that everything was going to be alright but those would have white lies.
L’manburg was gone and Techno had been the cause and Dream had helped temporarily until he realized the damage two withers could cause to the surrounding land. Wilbur and Dream had taken L’manburg away and Tommy was so sure he’d never be able to forgive them but he needed time to clear his head and think, and just generally be away from everything else, everyone else even Tubbo.
He sighed and closed his eyes. His arm would take probably a week or two to heal with the healing potions added to it was his last thought before he let his eyes fall shut.
[-----]
Waking up with a huge headache and still covered in his own blood and the blood of others was no fun, it was dried up and clinging to him and his pants. He was glad he kept spare clothes in his ender chest too. He shakily stood up grimacing as he looked down at his short sleeve shirt on the ground, seeing it practically drenched in blood most of it probably his own. He lifted it and threw it away from himself, he started a fire and made a hole in the caves ceiling, he’d put a trap door over it later, he broke and picked up his ender chest with his pickaxe, stashing it away in his inventory.
He opened a small doorway in the wall that closed him off from the outside world. He looked around ignoring the slight pain in his arm as he walked in a single direction following the sound of running water and was happy to find he was near a river. He sat down on the edge and pulled out his ender chest, setting it beside himself and pulling off the long sleeve shirt he normally wore and set it on the ground beside the ender chest and pulled the chest open grabbing a piece of cloth he could use to wash himself off.
Cleaning himself off was a little hard with a broken arm but he got things to work out, shivering in the cold water but once he was no longer covered in blood and sat down for a bit to dry off he got redressed in clean clothes which was a plain black tank top and dark grey shorts. He picked up his dirty long sleeve shirt and sat on the edge near the river and drenched the shirt in the water before he rang it out and drenched it again, repeating this several times before most of the blood was no longer clinging to the fabric of the shirt.
He picked the barely wet shirt up, alongside his ender chest and walked back to his cave. He left his shirt outside hanging over a tree branch in the sun and sat on the cold stone floor in silence, he sighed and pulled out his phone checking the amount of messages he had but not reading any of them, wincing when he saw the numbers. 542.
Most of them were asking where he was and were all from last night and stopped around an hour ago. He noticed it was no midday and sighed once again running his hand through his hair, he was happy he had taken out the tracker on his phone a long time ago when Dream had first given it to him. He wanted to be alone for a reason even if they were worried, but he did still feel a pang of guilt sitting here completely fine while they sat back at L’manburg’s ruin’s morning the death of their supposed hero that Techno tried to label him. But he didn’t want the title of a hero, he just wanted his home back.
Tommy reached into his ender chest and pulled out a jukebox and Mellohi and began playing the disc listening to the song play while nodding his head to the beat. He was oddly calm after everything just happened but he just round it up to him not full processing everything that just happened, he stopped nodding his head to the soft beat when he felt something fall against his knee and looked down seeing multiple small dots on his shorts, he blinked watching as tears fell from his eyes, as the edges of his vision became blurry.
He hadn’t noticed he had been crying.
He breathed in only for his breath to hitch as the tears continued to cascade down his cheeks, he lifted a hand to wipe them away but more soon replaced them. He sniffled softly and rubbed uselessly at his eyes wanting for the tears to go away but they didn’t, he checked his phone when it vibrated a signal that someone was talking in chat.
Tubbo: Are you happy Techno?
Tommy felt his heart stop for a few seconds seeing the message, he for some odd reason knew why Tubbo had sent that message and the tears continued stronger than they were before.
He sat there for hours on ends watching as that message flew by as others began to talk from where ever they are, the urge to type and just tell them he was okay was strong but if they did they’d start looking and wouldn’t stop until he was found and they knew he was okay even if he told them he was perfectly fine which he was with his broken arm. Soon night came and most said their good nights in the chat before going to bed. Tommy had a strong urge to return to the crater that was L’manburg and picked up his armor and sword, he also pulled out a torch and had a lantern with him but didn’t keep it on just in case it gave off too much light.
Putting on his armor was a lot harder with just one broken arm, in the end he only wore his leggings, boots and helmet and set out to see the damage of his home. The walk through the woods was a little scarier than it used to be but he knew he could still handle a mob even with a broken arm. Standing a few feet from the edge of the crater made his heart sink at seeing the damage, his gaze going everywhere until he stumbled closer looking into the crater below.
Most of the debris had been moved towards the walls of the crater leaving a open space in the middle where a gravestone sat with flowers surrounding it, standing before it was Phil, Techno and Wilbur accompanied by Niki, Eret, Fundy, Quackity, Dream, Sapnap, George and Karl. all of their expressions ranged from sorrowful, to angry to just blank. Tubbo, Dream and Techno were the few who had just blank empty expressions while Niki, Quackity and Sapnap were full on sobbing. Wilbur looked like he was in disbelief, bandaged heavily. George, Sapnap, Fundy and Phil just looked on with sorrow filled expressions.
“Are you happy Techno!” Everything was so quiet that Tubbo’s words were so clear. “You told him, ‘You wanna be a hero, then you can die like one’ so are you fucking happy” Tubbo hissed his words anger filled and jabbing. “You were right you know, good things never fucking happen to heroes” Tubbo hissed his finale words before he turned on his heels and stomped away Eret, Niki and Fundy following. Soon after was Dream, Sapnap, George, Karl and Quackity leaving Techno and Wilbur there with Phil.
Phil was standing a in front of the gravestone, Techno kneeling to his right and Wilbur kneeling to his left. Phil had either of his hands on their shoulders respectively.
“I’m am so unbelievably disappointed in the both of you” Phil whispered, Tommy watched practically breathless. “I want to be mad, but I can’t. I know Tommy wouldn’t want me to be”
“I remember, the first day you brought him home” Techno said quietly. “He was only 13 maybe even older and was practically skin and bones, a scrawny little thing and so unbelievably scared” Techno lifted his hands pulling off his crown and setting it on the ground beside the gravestone, he then pulled off his cape setting it behind the gravestone.
“It took us a month to get him to trust us,” Wilbur added, tears cascading down his cheeks, his hands clenched against the ground. “After he realized we wanted him to stay he practically clung to us” Wilbur laughed.
“Followed both you like a baby duck” Phil chuckled halfheartedly, Tommy couldn’t see it but Phil was crying, from the way his voice shook it was obvious. Phil crouched taking Wilbur’s hand into his own and helping him stand wrapping a wing around his back. Techno stood alongside both of them, Phil wrapping his other wing around his back and they made their way out of the crater.
Tommy left soon after that. He didn’t want to get spotted, it hurt to see them like this but he wanted his alone time, he wanted time to think.
[-----]
He let days go by mostly using his time to expand his small cave and created an indoor farm so he didn’t have to go outside. He took a page out of Techno’s book and made a potato farm with a wheat farm too, he had a lot of apples from grabbing wood to. He created an armor stand for his armor since he won’t be needing it for a while, he didn’t plan on getting into any conflict or hunting mobs just peaceful alone time. His mind wandered back to six days ago where he saw the gravestone in the crater and everything.
He couldn’t lie he was interested in what they planned on doing with the L’manburg now. But right now that didn’t matter, he was away from there and needed to stop thinking about it. He needed to stop remembering it for a while and just needed to enjoy the peace he had now. He had so much free time on his hands that he never really realized how much things he could get done within just a few hours.
The cave he settled into had been expanded inwards in the small hill he had found the cave at and there was a staircase leading down slightly. The area he made was somewhere between 15 to 20 blocks in a square and 5 to 7 blocks tall. The entrance on the inside was decorated with a wooden archway and he had switched out the floor near it with wood the walls now changed to stone brick. His wheat and potato farms were in the far corner of the rather large space.
Tommy sighed and stood to full height picking up his pickaxe and deciding it was best to get some ores just in case he needed more resources, it was better to be safe than sorry. The room he expanded had a ladder in the other corner opposite to his farms that led down, it was a bit hard to get down but he did his best and tried to get everything to work out even if he only had one arm to work with. His broken arm didn’t hurt anymore and he could move it around a little but didn’t want to get ahead of himself and start using it only for the pain to come back. He’d let it heal for another day or two before he took off the makeshift sling using his long sleeved shirt.
He was still wearing just the black tanktop and grey shorts. He began wandering the seemingly endless caves placing torches here and there with the acational mob to slay but that wasn’t much of a problem as he thought it’d be which was good because he didn’t want to struggle with killing mobs. At some point during his mining trip he got bored and decided to turn tail and return back to the main part of his base.
He had never realized how suffocating things could be back with the others, being alone and able to think was nice especially without the constant threats of war bearing down on him from ever which direction because apparently war was the only way to solve every conflict even if it was minor as a pet. Even if he did miss Henry nothing good came out of the conflict other than pain, the countless injuries he’s had because of these wars was honestly stupid and the amount of mining he’s had to do after to gain back all his items was also tedious and a little annoying.
Tommy sighed as he dropped his pickaxe onto the ground and flopped gently onto his bed. He stared at the ceiling for what felt like hours but was really only minutes, his mind was surprisingly empty, devoid of thoughts and Tommy didn’t entirely understand why he felt so overly calm. His mind was usually never this empty, always plagued with the thoughts of his next moves, of fighting, of war. It was surprising how clear his mind was and he couldn’t lie. It was a little overwhelming realizing how much his thoughts passed by and how much he spent his time overthinking about the war that was finally over. He had so much free time that he could properly think now.
He couldn’t stop the frown that pulled at his lips as he realized how much he still missed his friends, how he missed their voices. Despite most of the conflict that has happened between all of them he couldn’t help but miss everyone even those who were his enemies like Dream or even Bad and Sapnap it was an odd thing really, how much blind trust he put in these people.
Tommy huffed and stood up pushing the door to his cave open and letting it fall close behind himself. Stepping out into the morning sun was nice, he hadn’t realized he’d woken up quite early for his mining session, he sighed and began walking around changing around his inventory as he went to try and figure out what to do to entertain himself for the time being. He stopped when he heard something and turned.
He was a little surprised to come face to face with a Bee, he blinked at the fuzzy Bee and it blinked back the buzzing of its wings the only noise he could hear besides the soft ruffling of the trees. Tommy watched as the Bee turned and flew away, Tommy didn’t know why but he followed after it, walking for a few minutes they came to a stop at the edge of a meadow filled with flowers.
Tommy watched as the Bee moved over to a red flower, he turned his gaze to look around the meadow at all the other Bee’s moving around from flower to flower and couldn’t help but smile fondly, Tubbo would have been so excited to see all of these Bee’s. Tommy moved forward and sat down in a relatively clear space with no flowers. He picked a flower and slowly began to create a flower crown intertwining the stems of the flowers.
Once he was finished he looked at it in his hands, he could tell he was smiling and couldn’t help but be reminded of how Tubbo and Niki had taught him how make flower crowns, he had practiced for hours just to get it right so he could show them but in the end that time never came.
He looked back up when he felt something bump his head and blinked at a small Bee barely bigger than his hand. He huffed and lifted the crown onto his head then lifted his hand out to the Bee, he watched as he sat down on his hand it’s wings folding and the Bee closing its eyes. “Well who might you be?” Tommy asked quietly not to disturb the Bee. He’s always seen Tubbo talk to them like they could understand or responde which was funny but it wasn’t like he didn’t do the same for Henry.
He was a little surprised when another small Bee bumped into his ear before landing on his shoulder. He laughed lightly and lowered his hand into his lap to stare at the small Bee. “I’m gonna name you Corn” He grinned, the Bee opened its eyes to look at him blinking for a few seconds before it nuzzled into his hand, He turned to the other Bee on his shoulder. “And your name will be Butter”
Butter blinked at him but went back to nuzzling their head into his shoulder. He smiled and stood up noticing the sun was high up in the sky and he silently wondered how long he'd been there. He returned shortly to his base a little surprised that the two Bee’s he had named stuck to following him and not returning to their hives, not that he was complaining. He quickly made a bee hive since he had collected some honeycomb a while ago from some different bee hives.
He picked the wheat and potatoes from his farms and began organizing the ores he had gotten from his late morning mine session without knowing.
[-----]
Days went by and pretty soon a week turned from that to two, then to three and before anyone knew it a month went by since he technically faked his death. The more he thought about it the more his irrational fear came and told him they’d hate him after what he’d done that they’d shun him and never want to see him again, the guilt was eating away at him but he couldn’t return just yet.
With the ability to now use both his arms that helped with his recovery he began to gather more materials mostly, he had a lot more food now to being able to harvest and replant his crops faster than before.
He knew he shouldn't be worrying about his crops and more so about the fact of whether his friends will accept him back or not. He was so afraid that they wouldn’t want him back that he might have had a bit of a nightmare about it, about everyone yelling at him about how he could just up and fake his own death during such a dramatic time. He felt so incredibly selfish.
He had wanted to go back after three weeks but his irrational fears were getting the better of him and holding him back so he decided to wait a bit longer and see where things go. Over the past days he’d changed up his small cave a bit changing out the walls and flooring for black stone and other dark colors, he expanded it and he even had two new Bee’s to his hive. Of course Corn and Butter’s were still there with the addition of Titan and Willow, he also couldn’t forget about the white fox he found not too long ago that he named Nina after Niki since he remembered Niki had a fox.
He sighed and rolled over letting himself fall off his bed and onto the ground on his stomach, he snorted when he felt Nina nuzzle her snout against his forehead and lifted a hand pushing her away gently and sitting on crossed legged letting her crawl into his lap and curl up. He smiled and began to pet her, his gaze landing on the fire and watching it flicker, he mostly sat in silence listening to the sound the fire made of the small crack of the wood here and there.
He knew night was coming when he looked up at the clock above the door and couldn’t help but smile and set Nina on the ground beside him and pushed her to run off and sit in the corner where he knew she always slept. He stood and began digging around his small cave pulling out a cloak, he had stupidly gone back to Pogtopia and was surprised no one was there but had taken what he thought he’d need which was just some spare clothes and bandages. “Looks like it’s time to check out what’s happening in L’Manburg” He mutters to himself.